Feeding Your Fish

How to Feed Aquarium Fish and Choosing Foods from the Wide Variety Available

(The First Tank Guide)

Fish, like any other organism, need a supply of calories to sustain
their metabolism. Properly feeding your fish helps them to stay
healthy and is helpful in maintaining your aquarium. It is important
to know the types of foods your fish need and how much food they need,
which differs from species to species.

In most cases, fish only need to be fed once a day, and you only
need to feed a small amount. Your fish should be able to get enough
nutrients from the food they can consume in under two minutes, as long
as the food provides for their nutritional needs. Food that stays in
your tank longer than that can get caught in
your gravel, decorations, or filter and will begin to decay, contributing
to poor water quality. This poor water quality will increase disease susceptibility and filter
maintenance. It could also increase the need for water changes, which in turn stress the
filtration system and the fish, again increasing disease susceptibility. Small, regular
feedings provide fish with the nutrients they need and keep your tank
cleaner than large or more frequent feedings. Over feeding can also
contribute to algae growth, which can be
unsightly, remove vital oxygen from the water, and increase your tank maintenance chores.

Most fish, like most cold blooded vertebrates, are primarily
carnivorous, consuming mostly insects, insect larvae, worms, grubs,
various shrimps and similar animals, and smaller fish, some even
consuming small amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals in the wild.
However, almost all fish also graze on live plants, and there are very
few that do not consume at least some algae. So, you can see that
most fish are really omnivorous and need to get foods that contain
both animal and vegetable matter to remain healthy. Like
many children, a lot of fish would prefer to have a nice diet of rich
meaty foods and push their vegetables under the table cloth, but this
is not available in nature and should not be provided in the
aquarium. Though there are fish that are more herbivorous or more
carnivorous, there are few fish that are strictly herbivores or
carnivores.

There are hundreds of food options for your pet fish, and a
combination of foods from this selection is necessary to provide your
fish with the nutrients they need. All of these foods fall into two
broad categorizations of fish food: live and processed, which can be
broken down further as described below.

Live Fish Food

Live food consists of plants, animals, and microorganisms that are
living in your tank - or at least live when you introduce them to
your tank - that your fish can eat. It is important to make sure
that the live foods you provide for your fish provide all the
nutrients that your fish need to remain healthy and to grow properly,
and do not pose a risk to the fish. Many live foods, particularly
feeder goldfish, are very common vectors
for disease.

Many fish will graze a little on live plants and algae growing in
your aquarium, but some herbivores will voraciously eat any live
plants you put in the tank. Other fish will feed on microorganisms
that are free-floating in your aquarium water or growing on the
surface of plants and decorations. Still other fish will gladly eat
worms, snails, and/or other invertebrates that are introduced to the
aquarium. Many pet stores also provide a variety of insects and
insect larvae that are of nutritional value to fish.

The most common live foods used in the aquarium hobby are live feeder fish. These fish often do not
receive the care they need to remain healthy and are often carrying
diseases or parasites that could, in turn, infect any fish that eats
them. The best way to spread a disease from
one fish to another is for a fish to eat an infected fish! Also, in
many areas, the live foods that are available are very limited in
variety. A diet of just one food is almost guaranteed to be short on
some vital vitamins, minerals, or other nutrients that your fish
need.

Processed Fish Food

There are many categories of processed foods, including fresh, frozen,
freeze-dried, and canned.

Fresh foods include meats and vegetables with minimal processing.
Many fish will go wild for small (relatively) bits of beef, poultry,
seafood, or game meats, but you don't want to cook these foods in most
cases. A lot of fish will also enjoy bits of fresh vegetable matter,
such as raw potato, squash, zucchini, pea, bean, apple (without the
peel or seeds), and spinach. Again, as with live foods, you need to
make sure that the diet you have selected will meet the nutritional
needs of your fish.

Frozen foods are available from most pet stores in a wide
variety - from shrimp and squid to spirulina algae and vegetables
to processed, vitamin enhanced staple diets to aquarium delicacies
like sponges and insect larvae. The selection of frozen foods
available can provide a varied and stable diet for most fish, and the
processes that the foods go through when freezing greatly reduce the
risk of disease transfer when compared to live foods or fresh seafood,
wile maintaining a high nutritional value.

Many of the foods available as frozen foods also have a
freeze-dried counterpart. These foods have all of the moisture
extracted from them during processing so that they have a long shelf
life and can be stored easily. Many worms, insect larvae,
crustaceans, and meats are available in freeze dried forms. One
disadvantage of freeze dried foods is that the freeze-drying process
often strips vitamins from the food as well, so freeze dried foods are
not likely to make a balanced and complete diet. Remember when
feeding freeze-dried foods, that these foods can absorb a lot of
water, and will fill up your fish a lot more than you would think when
looking in the package. We recommend that you moisten freeze-dried
foods before feeding them to your fish to keep your fish from
overeating and making themselves sick.

Canned foods are often the best for a fish's staple diet. The
foods are engineered to provide a complete and balanced diet for your
fish and are available in a variety of forms: floating pellets,
sinking pellets, granules, tablets, and flakes.

Flakes are the most common type of processed foods, and are
available in a very wide variety. Some flakes are engineered to
provide the nutritional requirements of specific varieties or species
of fish, and others are designed to counter nutritional imbalances,
while still others are balanced to enhance color or growth or to
encourage spawning.

Pellets are available in forms that are denser or lighter than
water. This allows the fish to feed in a more natural way - if the
right pellet is provided. Some fish prefer to feed off the bottom of
the tank while others prefer to feed off the surface. Like flakes,
pelleted foods are available in many varieties, each with a specific
purpose.

Granules are like very small, hard flakes or tiny pellets.
Currently only a limited variety of fish food granules are available,
usually engineered for the general nutritional needs of small
community fish.

Tablets are really just large flat pellets. Most tablets are of
a sinking variety, but there are some that are engineered to adhere to
the side of the aquarium so that you may observe your fish feeding.
Most of the sinking tablets are engineered to provide for the
nutritional needs of scavengers and bottom feeders.

Regardless of the type of foods you decide to feed your fish, you
should provide them with a variety of foods. Variety in the diet
reduces the chance of any nutritional shortcomings of one or more of
your selected foods becoming a health or longevity problem for your
fish. Providing a variety of foods will also reduce the chances that
your fish loose interest in the foods that they are offered and go on
a "hunger strike."